Vade Mecum
by Under the Oak Tree
Summary: A collection of drabbles.
1. Price

**Title: **The Price  
**Rating: **PG-13  
**Pairing: **None  
**Word Count: **262  
**Warning/s: **None really.  
**Summary: **The realization that Clow Reed had paid a very high price.  
**Dedication:** Lisa, the LibraryCat who threatened me with vampires and Lucius Malfoy to keep me writing.

**A/N: **Celeste1 who wrote the best collection of Bleach drabbles. Ever. She's the reason I'm starting this.

* * *

There is nothing free in this world. 

A truism, and one that had never failed him throughout the long years. The immense power he wielded with enviable ease was paid with loneliness and the grief of watching loved ones leave him, lost to age, infirmity, to mortality.

Of which he was immune to.

Ironic, that the most powerful magician of the time wanted nothing more than to die.

There is a price for everything.

He tucked the heavy, leather bound and gilt-edged book back on the shelf, giving it one, last fond pat.

_What do you wish for the most, Master?_

_To not know the future, _he had answered, and it saddened him to cause such pain in his creations. His immense power gave him foresight, and it extracted payment with inability and inevitability.

To what lengths would you go to, to achieve your dreams?

He sat back in his favourite armchair, the velvet worn in places but that, in his opinion, made it all the more comfortable. Made it his. He arranged his robes with fastidious care, carefully aligning the edges together and neatly tucked his hands inside the opposite sleeves.

What would the most powerful magician in the world pay, to be rid of his power and the ability to see the future?

Everything.

Anything.

As the fat moon rose high, high enough that he could no longer see it from his chair and through the tall windows, Clow Reed closed his eyes, smiled a little smile that would have made Cerberus' hackles rise, and tore his soul apart.

**End.**


	2. Sorcerer

**Title:** Sorcerer  
**Rating:** PG-13  
**Pairing: **Hints of Clow x Yuuko. If you squint a little. Maybe read it sideways. Hints of a crossover but I'm not tellin'.  
**Word Count:** 1891  
**Warning/s:** None really. 'Cept that its un-beta'd. Yep, I can hear people screaming and running for the hills now.  
**Summary: **Clow meddles with time and the fates of two young people. Yuuko doesn't like it but irony crops up in the strangest places.  
**Dedication:** Lisa, the LibraryCat who is my sanity. Myself, for writing this. And to our loyal readers, patiently waiting despite the _really_ long hiatus. The next chapter of WDCAK is coming, I swear!

* * *

"Meddling again, Clow?" 

He smiled, the barest upturn of the corners of thin lips, the lightest crinkles between his ageless brows. The magician did not cease in his casting, long, agile fingers that could coax tears from a lute dancing unfathomable patterns over water in a silver-plated bowl. Images rippled and undulated, ceaselessly changing as he threaded possibilities, causes and effects into a stolen fabric of time and space.

Her perfume heralded her closeness – the sharpness of spices, overlaying a deeper hint of incense that beguiled customers, friends and enemies alike. He was none of those to her, and yet more, and she the same which is why Clow Reed allowed her to drape slim, languid arms around his shoulders, nuzzling like a kitten with hidden claws. Beads and trinkets tinkled as her hair slithered around him, draping the immortal wizard with an ebony cloak shot through with diamonds. _Gypsy_, always, that separate, analytical part of his mind noted. Though Mor—_Yuuko_, he chided himself—

_ (The old name was discarded, along with the weight of its responsibilities and the stigma, but never the scars.)_

—_Yuuko_ always did have a sense for the dramatic. Where a _čhej_ would have donned a more practical skirt and blouse, what Yuuko wore would have sent a proper _romni_ screaming for her husband and chasing after the laughing, unrepentant sprite with a frying pan. Gauzy scarves hid nothing of the lithe, never-aging body clad in a peasant blouse that seemed more promise than cloth, and never-ending legs were encased in calf leather of the smoothest butter. All this and more Yuuko showed him, dancing in circles of shimmering magic, incense and wind-borne laughter. Clow tolerated her performance with a patience that had weathered ages, fingers slowing their work of spell and stars as he paid her the proper attention she deserved. Rare it was, for a witch of her stature to show anyone not her blood or apprentice, the physical manifestation of her power, and when the rare did happen, respect ought to be paid.

She ended her dance with a bow of belled, dainty, slipperless feet, floating into a satisfied languor of purrs and wicked giggles at his feet. He heard the unspoken demand, and made space for her in his wingback armchair, not minding when even his lap was appropriated by the Time Witch. "Naughty Clow," she sang in a breathless whisper, carmine lips tracing a path over alabaster skin, refusing to be discouraged by the wizard's lack of reaction, nevermind that kings and sorceres alike had fallen before her mere touch. Clow Reed was more, and for that, she did not use her spells and wish-granting, oh no. For Clow Reed, once called _Raksha_, had no need for wishes and dreams. He charted his own path and those he deemed worthy of his attention. But, and here a delicate copper bell chimed in a predatory glee, when the mighty falls, oh, she would dance and sing on his bones, and cry his tears and ground his essence to be made into the mightiest of spells.

"Dreaming of my death, gypsy witch?" His voice was soft, his breath, warm and scented faintly with the grape wines from the south. Clever hands, sparkling still from his disrupted work caressed her jeweled hair the way she liked it, and Yuuko shivered her delight.

"Always," she purred. "And always, the scene changes, as does the time. You continue to vex me, wizard. When would you cease your naughtiness and play mortal, like all fallible humans do?'

A hand tugged a lock of silken ebony hair in playful reprimand. "When my work is done, you know that, gypsy witch. Then, you may toy with me as you wish, for the rest of eternity."

She pouted, and Clow hid a smile at the endearing childishness, even if the eyes showed bottomless depth that neither knew pity, nor sorrow. Time, and here Clow hid another smile, would change that. Ironic that the Mistress could not see her own fate, as did the wizard and his own. But they knew the other's, and endless games had been played with knowledge as the bargaining chips.

"Would you like to see?' he offered abruptly, and his intent was clear, slender hands framing the rune-etched, silver bowl in between. A low, almost sibilant hiss and the rustle of wings in the deepest shadows were his companions' alarm at his decision to, and he sent both Moon and Sun Guardian a chiding look. _My will, my decision_. Few were the times he imposed his authority over the two he created and loved like his own, and it never brought him pleasure how easily they submitted to him, their God and creator. Necessity, he comforted himself, and would Yuuko laugh if she knew he needed such reassurance.

The sorceress in question threw him an amused glance under thick lashes of delicate, butterflies' feelers, but she accepted his offer graciously, though she spoiled the illusion of haughtiness with the imperious demand for the seer's bowl to be brought closer for her viewing pleasure. Clow complied, even going so far as to mould their surroundings for comfort, and Yuuko mewled in delight over the carpet of lavender crushed beneath them, and the butterflies that swam thickly across a summer sky unknown to any but a few.

"Look," he chided, redirecting her attention to the waters that trembled and shone with captured magic, the silver singing a high, faintly heard pitch in resonance. "Do you see? Of the many possibilities of my leaving this form, two branches resonates with the best chances in receiving my gift."

"Gift?" Yuuko's lips parted, revealing even white teeth as she laughed gaily, tugging the short ponytail he affected to better scandalise his mortal neighbours. "Gift, you call it, Clow Reed. A curse, is what they would better name it. Your powers are too much for you to die a nameless death, yet, double-edged is Damocles' Sword, for it has scoured you barren of seed, with no heir to shoulder your mantle. Gift?"

"Gift," he echoed wryly, not minding the malicious jab the Time Witch delivered so callously. "The truth is often best delivered in a pretty wrapping, my gypsy, if only to soften the blow."

"Pretty wrappings, and pretty bows. How does that charming little ditty goes, that your favourite urchin has so wickedly written on his lovers' silken sheets?"

Clow laughed, a warm baritone that set fields of lavender dipping their heads in the balmy wind. " 'What's in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet.' I believe it is his current favourite, and he swears it is the birthing pangs of the greatest play ever written."

A disdainful flick of her hand said what Yuuko thought of such, but she nestled herself comfortably against his chest, threading her fingers through the loosened fall of his hair. "Show me then," she demanded. "Show me the webs you spin, so that I might better plot how to ruin it."

"As you wish," he acquiesced with solemn grace that should not be found lying in a field under a warm sun with a fey creature by his side. The enchanted waters rippled and sang softly, and Clow Reed parted the essence of time and space.

"A boy and a girl," Yuuko breathed, white fingers dancing with Clow's, drawing forth images that played silent, in harmony alongside the other. "How like you, Clow, to seek such balance. One from the East, and the other, from the West. One marked by your blood, the other, marked by a curse you created. The irony!"

Clouds of fragile wings streamed over an endless expanse of sky, startled into flight by the Time Witch's peals of laughter. "So you have chosen them?" she gasped, cheeks flushed with mirth. "Two to bear your gift, wizard, that you might find eternal rest?"

"Two, I have chosen," he agreed gravely, and fields and suns became nothing more than a large, echoing manor, and a deep, faded yet comfortable wingback chair he had plotted many a schemes in. Yuuko herself stood before him, whimsical fancies restored to heavy robes layered in silks that knew no human seamstress' hands, and gold mined from earths long destroyed adorned her wrists, ankles and hair. Her kohl-slanted eyes saw the man in his entirety, mercilessly stripping him to his core and judging what she found. Her painted lips stayed fixed in a bleak line.

"Your meddlesome ways skirts the edge of danger, wizard." Her voice cracked like thunder in that vast, empty room and no amount of loyalty or love could defrost the frozen limbs of his guardians, transfixed in their places, to rush to their master's defense. Tellingly, Clow did not act as one who needed protection.

He spread empty hands, his tools gone, his voice mild with censure. "We do as we are, Yuuko the Time Witch. I do as my destiny has allowed me to, as yours will."

She tossed back her head, regal in her anger. "Choices would not be called so if it were forced on them, Clow Reed. You know that better than any mortal. I grant wishes, for a price. Dare you ask one of me now?"

"I never did, nor do I plan to," he corrected her gently, and her eyes widened in understanding.

"Sorcerer," she accused him, though her hands remained in their perfumed sleeves and her pose, a provocateur's.

At this, the wizard's calm countenance showed the fire he kept hidden behind a kindly smile, a flash of something dark and dangerous that set the witch's nerves on edge, spells crackling between her fingertips. "And how," he asked quietly, "Am I any different from you?"

She flinched, thrown back by the stark reminder Clow so efficiently dredged up – of the seeing he had enacted for her long ago, of a boy who saw demons and ghosts who would be lured into her domain through no fault of his own, and the sacrifices two innocent youths would be forced to make for the sake of her plans.

A cascade of frozen wisterias hid her expression for an instant and when she turned back, her face was once again a calm mask. "Point, wizard. As you have reminded me, my payment to you is overdue. What do you wish?"

At long last, a warm smile graced his features, softening the stark lines and lending a semblance of mortality. Yuuko swallowed back a curse, wishing she had not seen that moment of weakness.

"I ask for nothing but the execution of your duties, gypsy witch, should either enter your shop and request your services."

"So be it."

They stared at each other, and a moment might have passed, or longer, and neither cared. Yuuko was the first to relent, and in a jingle of bells and seductive perfume, she bent down to bestow a soft kiss on the wizard's cold cheek. "You play such dangerous games, my friend," she murmured.

He caught her hand before she left, the slight squeeze more eloquent than any words that impertinent bard he had befriended could have managed. "Goodbye, Yuuko, my gypsy witch."

"Goodbye, Clow Reed." And the last of her whisper echoed round and round the lonely manor, a dying eddy in the cold fireplace.

"_Sleep well, my friend."_

* * *

**A/N: **Yes, this will remain a one-shot. I refuse to get dragged into another epic-length fic. I got enough unfinished ones to contend with. Any guesses as to who the boy and girl is? It's glaringly obvious, innit? I lack subtlety, I swear... 


End file.
